Spinoza's evaluation of Descartes' free will

This paper examines Deccartes’ theory of the freedom of the will and Spinoza’s well-known criticisms of it. In Spinoza’s critique of Descartes’ account of relation between intellect and will there seem to be two main strands. The first hinges on Spinoza’s theory of judgment and his thesis of the inseparability, in judgment, of the intellect and the will. The second strand relates to a more pervasive and general feature of Spinoza’s philosophy- his thoroughgoing determinism. Spinoza does not think that the will is distinct from the intellect, nor that it is endowed with the kind of freedom that Descartes postulates. As Spinoza himself puts it at Ethics II P48, in the section which leads on into the critique of Descartes we have just examined, there is no absolute or free will [sc. Of the kind Descartes supposed]. Cartesian freedom, Spinoza insists, is a kind of illusion. Men think themselves free because they are conscious of their volition, but not the causes thereof . For Spinoza , the non-freedom of the will (in what they take to be the “absolute” Cartesian sense) follows from the particular brand of rationalism. In the case of Spinoza, the denial of absolute freedom flows from what is often called his necessitarianism- a doctrin that is expressed most concisely in the Metaphysical Thoughts. The precise sense in which all things are ‘necessery’ for Spinoza has been the subject of debate: it is possible that he is prepared to allow that individual truths are not absolutely, but only ‘relatively’ necessary. But did Descartes in fact postulate the existence of an absolute, contra-causal freedom of the kind which Spinoza denied? In this paper will be argued that Spinoza misinterpreted Descartes on this point; the position which they take to be the Cartesian one does not correspond to the stance which Descartes centrally and characteristically adopts in his discussions of freedom. The centeral Cartesian position on freedom is much closer to that of Spinoza; indeed there is a sense in which Spinoza’s views, so far from being in radical conflict with Descartes’ , can be seen as a natural development of those of his predecessor. To describe Spinoza as having misinterpreted Descartes at once needs qualifying. The absolutist position which he attributes to Descartes is one for which some support can be found in the Cartesian texts. Unfortunately, the way Descartes expresses himself concerning the freedom of the will is often confusing; frequently his remarks seem open to an indeterministic interpretation. In spite of some important differences, there are many ways in which Spinoza’s views, so far from being anti-Cartesian, can be seen as a natural development of those of Descartes. Spinoza’s general critique of the Cartesian theory of the will dose not take sufficient account of what Descartes actually claimed, and that if the Cartesian concept of freedom is properly understood, Spinoza is closer to it than he himself recognized.